Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n
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A41127
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Some kindling sparks in matters of physick to satisfie some physicians who are of opinion that spirits (which they call hot things) do burn and inflame the body / written formerly to a friend by Albertus Otto Faber.
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Faber, Albert Otto, 1612-1684.
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1668
(1668)
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Wing F70; ESTC R37760
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5,662
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9
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some measure homogeneal to Life yet without a preparation in the best manner are hardly fit to kindle or nourish Life in order to consume or expel diseases from the Body But when they are duly prepared their effects will be the better and more evident As for instance When it happens that any body is taken with a sudden fright his Life becomes weak which may cause him to swoon away then if the Life be furnished with something of its nature that is with a fiery Medicine well prepared as may be a good Aqua vitae or the like he will recover instantly and what quantity then he doth drink it will not intoxicate him but it repaireth presently into the chief residence of life to assist and go along with it The same may be seen in any man tyred out for when he drinks a good draught of Aqua vitae he gathereth strength again presently and therefore it is ignorantly spoken that it would burn a man because Fire cannot burn Fire but Fire is refreshed by Fire and they increase one another rejoycing mutually as being of one nature But Water and cold things will quench it because they have no unity with Fire nay they are death to the Fire Therefore the more any Medicine partakes of fiery qualities the more it is of the nature of Life and can strengthen it the better to expel the Disease and settle it again in its own seat The Scripture saith that the Life of the Body is in its Blood and whoever will try this must anotomize it with Fire which will manifest a most fiery Spirit or volatile Salt This Spirit doubtless is in the Blood the residence of the Life or at least its food as Wood for Fire Now observe the better every norishment is prepared the fitter it is for digestion as raw flesh would not agree with the Stomack of a Man but when it is rosted or boyled tender it is of an easie digestion So vulgar Medicines rawly and roughly wrought and compounded would hardly be so acceptable or welcome as when they are brought to a more spiritual substance by the Spagirical Anotomy of the Fire coming nearer to the nature of Life For the panting Life in reference to its weakness greedily sucks such a Medicine even as the Load-stone attracts Iron to its self And being thereby relieved and refreshed drives the Disease out of the Body and repaireth to its place And such a Medicine may justly be called a Cordial as refreshing the Spirit of Life which is no such Pottage as being well sweetened with Sugar is termed a Cordial yet void of admittance into the society of Life to corroborate the swouning Spirits as being most commonly heterogeneal to them What kind of Medicines then are the best next to that that could be wished for out of Gold Note that I have said 1. That the Blood is the seat of Life 2. That the application ought to be made to the Life 3. That the Blood contains a most fiery Spirit and a volatile Salt and 4. That the food of Life is that most fiery Spirit and volatile Salt According to these Principles experience hath taught that whatsoever has been done worthy of note has been effected either by Fiery Spirits or Volatile Salts as being ready to joyn presently with the food of Life against the Distempers and to get Victory if the Patient be not past cure All created sublunary things are divided into Animals Vegetables and Minerals And we find that the first yeelds a Fiery Spirit and Volatile Salt as well in the Urine as in the Flesh and Blood both of an excellent fiery quality and eminently medicinal In the Vegetables we find nothing more effectual than their Spirits as well their essential and volatile Salts And especially when their Alcaliis may be disclosed or extracted and brought unto that prerogative of volatility In the Minerals we find the Sulphurs of Minerals and Mettals after they are separated by Fire from the crude malignant Mercuriality who being then harmless are called Tinctures Now these sulphurous Tinctures Spirits and Salts do all partake of the fiery quality and are apt therefore to joyn with the Life which is Fire against the Distemper and root it out of the Body Therefore let no body henceforth be so ignorant as to say that a Phisitian making use of those excellent Medicines doth burn the Patient when in the mean time others go about to feed the Fire of Life with Water or rather to quench it totally Object But what shall we do when a Patient lies in a great burning heat shall we then put fire to fire Answ This is indeed the only thing that has hitherto deceived many Physitians to avoid hot things as they call them to be administred to such as lie in a hot burning fit Therefore remember what I have said of the Life as being Caelestial Fire and Light most natural to the Body without which the Body is cold dark and dead To this take notice of this instance viz. That when Iron or the like is put into Aquafortis though it feeleth coldish yet presently it grows hot and boyls without Fire in so much that a man with his bare hand cannot hold the Vessel that contains it This burning heat seems unto Man to arise from the violent action of the Aquafortish Spirit upon the Iron which the eye may easily disern Suppose thou wouldst quench this hot burning Fire by pouring much cold Water upon it as a thing contrary to the Fire though that boyling may seem to cease and be as it were quenched yet in effect it will prove the same because it will consume the Iron one way as well as the other way however more slowly and insensibly when Water is poured upon it Therefore to put cold things to this fire is not the way to quench it But wilt thou do right then give to the Spirit to eat or devour Salt thus he shall lose his strength be broken and leave boyling with consuming Here appears that the Salt is not a cold thing yet able to make peace betwixt hot things viz. the Aquafortis and the Iron In like manner when such a burning heat rises in a sick body it rises from a parallel action betwixt two things working upon one another And therefore make thy applications not with cold things immediately to the hot burning which is nothing material but only an accidental quality or symptome flowing from the action of these two fighting things aforesaid upon the Body But make thy applications to either of them two and break its strength then presently the heat will cease and this may be done with hot things so called as well as any other may think to do it with cold ones which the Salia before declared of although being in their center a meer Fire will experience and make true in so much that by the application of them the said burning will not only be quenched but the Spirit of Life mightily strengthened also and thereby enabled to overpower its enemies who endeavour to quarter in its strong-hold The Body of Man is filled every where with Volatile Salt nay it is but little else than a Volatile Salt throughout save the contents of the Stomach and its government whose fermental moisture is acid parallel to Vinegar Spirit of Sulphur or the like acid Liquors But acid Liquors and volatile Salts are enemies fighting together to over-power one another Hence when perhaps something acid falls beyond the said government of the Stomach then presently rises a fight between the said acid and volatile Salt in the region of the Blood where the said acid is a stranger falling as a Pirate into the Native Countrey of the volatile Salt whose dominion is in the Blood of which fight flows as it were an hot invisible vapour like unto the radiant shining of the Sun throughout the Body and makes the Physician believe that it is the Distemper it self when in the mean while the very root of the Distemper is hidden from his eyes Therefore he goes on to quench that burning heat with cold things so called by which only he weakeneth the natural Fire of Life and for the expectation of having quenched the said burning heat he has given to that strange Pirate a large compass to waste insensibly the Garrison of the Blood viz. the volatile Salt in it and so being deceived himself he deceiveth his Patient also not of set-purpose but being not perswaded otherwise and therefore worthy of compassion When one takes Cochinele which is like meerly coagulated Blood and dissolveth it in Water then poureth Aquafortis thereupon there will presently appear an action betwixt the said Cochinele and the Aquafortis which may serve for an Instance whereby the eye of man may discern as it were demonstratively what it effects when such an acid Guest draweth into the Blood Thus I have somewhat answered to that vulgar Objection which might have been move enlarged if my intention had been bent to that purpose yet it may suffice to such as can kindle a Fire although having nothing else but this Tinder Spark London the 9th of January 1664 5. Alb. O. Faber
SOME Kindling Sparks In Matters of PHYSICK TO Satisfie some Physicians who are of opinion That Spirits which they call hot things do burn and inflame the Body Written formerly to a Friend BY Albertus Otto Faber London Printed in the Year 1668. To the Reader THou shalt not read here any great matter for there are but toucht two or three strings of a well tuned Instrument that gives more Sound then Harmony yet enough to judge whether the sound be good We expect a fundamental reformation in this matter as well as in other things For when the season is at its birth it will come notwithstanding the weak contrivances and oppositions of men Nature her self is weary with furnishing her matter to such as are ignorant of its use according to her intentions For though she cries Trace me trace me yet men are deaf and self-endedness cannot see the Sun it self although she gives here and there light evident enough Therefore at last she will arise and dash gainsaiers to confusion Some kindling Sparks in matters of PHYSICK A Physitian is to be considered in his place as a Minister to the life of Man as to the health of his Body There are therefore four things to be observed here 1. Life 2. Health 3. Body 4. Man 1. What Life is Note that a Body without Life is cold hard and stiff that is dead but when it is alive it is warm soft and nimble As for instance The Earth which is the great World in Winter is cold hard and frozen that is dead But when in the Spring the Sun enlivens it then it revives becoming warm and yeelding a living motion of vegitation So also Man who is accounted the little World or Microcosm when dead his Corps is cold hard and stiff because it is deprived of life But when Life springs up therein then he quickens and grows warm giving in all actions and doings evidence of life Therefore like as the Sun that revives the Macracosm or the Earth and warms it is a heavenly Fire known by his effects So the life of Man is a Microcosmical Sun viz. a Subcoelestial Fire reviving warming and moving his body to the end he may be enlightned 2. Health is a cumulative influence of well-being proceeding from life throughout the Body By the word Cumulative is to be understood a mutual concurrence of life and health in part of the Body in so much that life and health can never subsist separately no more than the Sun-shine can subsist without the Sun it self and the Sun cannot be without his shining or light As for Example When a Man is wounded in his foot then health being disordered life is also weakned 3. The Body is the vessel of life and health so exactly fitted and proportioned as a Watch that the least Atome crossing its Structure is able to bring both life and health into a confusion yea to total ruine 4. Man is as to his material form a compound of life and body which being well or ill influenced is healthful or sickly So having declared that a Physician is a Minister to the Life of Man as to the health of his body it appears plainly whether unto the Life Health or Body he ought to make his applications when Man is at a loss As to the Body If we consider it either as it was in the beginning before it received life by divine inspiration or as it is after the life has left it and the applications of a Physician thereon were attempted they would be as ridiculous as fruitless no less than if they were applyed to an Image of Wood Brass or Iron As to the Health the thing in question which is lost and absent there can be made no application As for instance When a Husbandman has intrusted a Shepherd with a flock of Sheep and one of them is gone astray He for the recovering the lost Sheep doth not apply himself to the Sheep lost and absent which to the flock is as in a state of privation but to the Shepherd to demand it at his hands To the Life therefore as to the Shepherd of health a true Physitian makes his applications for its recovery which is in statu privationis Now the Life being a fiery principle of Man as before is demonstrated which enlighteneth the Body and makes it active we must know when such a principle becomes defective weak and helpless with what kind of things to supply the same which supplies are called Medicines wherein lies the skill of a Physician But that being of a large consideration for want of the Adeptive Science which might shorten all those many particular preparations I shall at present speak only something in general And first of all to conform my expressions to the mean apprehensions of the unlearned note this instance That when thou intendest to kindle a Fire thou dost not pour Water upon it but something of its nature viz. some Sparks of its kind that is Fire must be kindled with Fire and not with Water And likewise if a Fire be kindled and grows weak thou usest the same means to encrease it as thou didst to kindle it or something homogeneous to it viz. by putting Fewel as Wood Coals Oyl c. to it to strengthen feed and relieve it But if thou puts thereto Water Stones and such like thou wouldst sooner quench then restore thy Fire Hence the Maxime is to be understood We are nourished with that of which we are made The Heaven the World or Earth and Man correspond mutually together The Sun taken as the life of the Heaven shining into the Water reflects its own Image as in a Looking-glass it doth the like on the Earth which being not diaphanous makes it not appear as the Water doth Yet the Earth being the Mother of Corporification the influences from above keeps the said Image closer and makes it substantial appearing in a body as being the earthly Sun and it is called Gold In like manner the Body of Man being so far prepared in the womb that it is capable of life then by the all-overpowring Sun in a moment as Brimstone or Spirit of Wine it conceives Fire viz the Image of the said Sun and makes it substantial to its nature which then is called Life he thus being Lampas vitae Hence this Maxime Sol homo generent hominem Thus even as the Heaven the Earth and Man So the Sun Gold and Life are knit together by influence which may be sensibly perceived when there happens either almost or a total Eclipse of the Sun and many find themselves breathless through the obstruction of the Sun's influence The Life of Man therefore being either weak or otherwise defective its proper Remedy would be Gold as to relieve Fire with Fire But as is abovesaid it cannot easily be dealt withall and must be laid aside for the Adepti So there remains nothing but Wood Coals or the like combustible matter which however they are in